Airbus CEO Louis Gallois: Power8 prepares way for "New Airbus"
"We cannot continue to produce at our current Euro costs and sell at Boeing's dollar prices,"
so (same document):
A large part of the cost savings will be achieved through reducing the total Airbus overhead workforce (including temporary and on-site supplier workforce) by 10,000.
Subcontractors are also being substantially reduced. That's happening in a fairly complicated way I haven't got a handle on. But production is being outsourced to dollar zone and low-labour-cost countries.
So "layoffs" are "unlikely" essentially because they've already been made.
(It would be interesting to see what Melanchthon has to say, he may know more about this than I do. Also our much-regretted friend Elco B, where are you, Elco?)
As to EU or government attitudes, they've always been broadly supportive of Power8 afaik. Only if the crisis really began causing a lot more trouble would I expect Sarkozy to step in, and more likely on his hobby horse of "the euro is too dear". In other words, not in favour of good French-German coordination on this...
"EADS has to become a normal company," President Sarkozy said at the Paris Air Show last month, underlining complications caused by the group's unusual management and shareholder structure."We agree with the view that a company like EADS can only exist if it has efficient structures," said Merkel at the end of May after a meeting with the French Prime Minister Francois Fillon.
Or: we've seen that close coordination between Germany and France on a major industrial project (building a new airplane) was difficult. So now we're going to draw in many more partners!
It's a short term strategy that will come to bite Airbus in the back.
The Associated Press: Airbus A350 development on track
Bregier gave few details on how Airbus plans to finance the euro10 billion ($13.26 billion) A350 program. He said the development costs have so far been funded by Airbus and some of its suppliers in a risk-sharing program."We are not in a hurry to find other ways despite the difficulties we know our customers will face in 2009," he said.Airbus may also seek government aid to create a "level playing field" with Boeing's 787, which he said "got a lot of subsidies."
Bregier gave few details on how Airbus plans to finance the euro10 billion ($13.26 billion) A350 program. He said the development costs have so far been funded by Airbus and some of its suppliers in a risk-sharing program.
"We are not in a hurry to find other ways despite the difficulties we know our customers will face in 2009," he said.
Airbus may also seek government aid to create a "level playing field" with Boeing's 787, which he said "got a lot of subsidies."
nanne:
Which is all fine but doesn't explain why we should be subsidising jobs in China and Russia, plus the bootstrapping of the Chinese and Russian airspace industry, at a time when even Boeing has gotten the memo that global sourcing has gone too far.
Otherwise the entire pretense that EADS is a 'normal' company is no longer relevant in a time when governments are bailing out much more normal companies throughout the economy. Sure, there needs to be some restriction on government interventions. But in this case it is clear that Airbus' strategy has some elements that are not in its own long-term interest.
i'm also concerned about chinese quality control, bolts shearing etc.
they're not ready yet... ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
must. slow. down. ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
Thanks, melo. I take no offense for being exchanged for linca.
Of course the other thing that Power8 highlights is that the imagined economic model where workers in Europe "move up the value chain" into "hi-tech manufacturing" is just a bust.
